DECISION-MAKING

Decision is good when it comes out of life; it is bad when it comes only out of the head. And when it comes only out of the head it is never decisive; it is always a conflict. The alternatives remain open and the mind goes on and on, from this side to that. That’s how the mind creates conflict.

The body is always herenow, the mind is never herenow; that is the whole conflict. You breathe here and now, you cannot breathe tomorrow and you cannot breathe yesterday. You have to breathe this moment, but you can think about tomorrow and you can think about yesterday.

So the body remains in the present and the mind goes on hopping between past and future, and there is a split between body and mind. The body is in the present and the mind is never in the present; they never meet, they never come across each other. And because of that split, anxiety, anguish and tension arise; one is there. This tension is worry.

The mind has to be brought to the present, because there is no other time.

Step 1: Watch Your BreathingJust sit in a chair, relaxed, make yourself comfortable and close your eyes. Just start looking at the breathing. Don’t change it; just look, watch. By your watching it, it will become slower and slower and slower. If ordinarily you take eight breaths in one minute, you will start taking six, five, four, three or two.

Within two or three weeks you will be taking one breath per minute. When you are taking one breath per minute the mind is coming closer to the body. Out of this small meditation a time comes when for minutes the breathing stops. Three or four minutes pass and then one breath. Then you are in tune with the body and you will know for the first time what the present is.

Otherwise it is just a word; the mind has never known it, the mind has never experienced it. It knows the past, it knows the future, so when you say present, the mind understands something in between past and future, in between something, but the mind has no experience of it.

So for one hour every day, relax into breathing and let the breathing go. It goes automatically. When you walk it goes automatically. Slowly, slowly there will be gaps and those gaps will give you the first experience of the present. Out of these days, suddenly the decision will arise, whatsoever it is.

It is immaterial what decision comes up. The most important thing is from where it comes; not what it is, but from where it comes. If it comes from the head it will create misery.

But if some decision arises from your totality then you never never repent for a single moment. A man who lives in the present knows nothing of repentance; he never looks back, he never changes his past and his memories and he never arranges his future.

Decision from the head is an ugly thing. The very word decision means ‘de-cision’; it cuts you off. It is not a good word. It simply means it cuts you off from reality. The head continuously cuts you off from reality.

My whole emphasis is on this moment, because this moment contains all. Now is the only reality — all else is either memory or imagination. And even for the past to exist as memory, now is needed. It doesn’t exist as the past; it exists as a thought in the present.

So is the case with the future: the future does not exist as the future, it exists as imagination in the present moment. All that exists, exists in the now. Now is the only time there is.